On Sunday morning, la palestre is open for anyone who feels like practicing. A couple of coaches are there to supervise. When we come in, they are huddled together on metal folding chairs, sipping coffee from reusable cups.
Genevieve, Anastasia, Hana and I head for the long blue spring floor designed for tumbling. We warm up with a few somersaults, but soon we’re doing cartwheels and then roundoff back handsprings. The floor makes a bam-bam sound every time we land on it.
The spring floor is surrounded by large rectangular pits, each of them filled with oversized yellow Styrofoam cubes. If we miss our mark, the cubes will ensure a cushy landing.
The floor is wide enough for two girls to use at once. While I await my turn, I dive into one of the pits. Just for fun. Wading between the Styrofoam cubes makes me feel like a little kid again.
Next thing I know, Genevieve is diving in too. When I see her body flying toward me, I step away as quickly as I can. What is she trying to do—crash into me?
Genevieve is on her knees, grinning up at me. “Did I mention Leo is taking me skating today?” she asks.
“You mentioned it.” I almost add that she’s mentioned it a thousand times, but I don’t want her to know I care.
“He really likes me.”
“If you say so.”
Genevieve wades closer to where I am, until her face is only inches away from mine. “Of course I say so. And you’re wasting your time flirting with him.”
I don’t know what bothers me more—the fact that her face is so close to mine or that she’s accusing me of flirting with Leo.
“I’m not a flirt,” I say. “Besides, I can’t help it if he likes me too.”
“He doesn’t!” Genevieve’s voice carries in the air. One of the coaches tilts his head in our direction.
“He does too. But you know what, Genevieve? Some of us have more important things on our minds than boys.”
“Like what?” she says.
“Like circus.”
Genevieve makes a snorting sound. “If there’s only room for one aerialist at the MCC, we both know who it’ll be. Me! Not just because I’m a better climber than you are, but because I do tissu.”
It’s my turn to snort. “Tissu’s a cliché. Rope is way more interesting.”
Genevieve’s eyes are shining. “Interesting? Interesting only goes so far! People come to the circus to see something—and someone—beautiful.”
“They want more than beauty. They want innovation!” I don’t mean to raise my voice, but Genevieve is getting to me.
“You’re just mad you don’t do tissu!” Genevieve hisses.
“That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard!”
The coach stands up from his folding chair. But it’s Hana who intervenes. She somersaults into the pit, landing next to me. In seconds, she bounces up on her feet, inserting herself between Genevieve and me.
“If you two keep fighting, you will make trouble for all of us!” Hana raises her eyes toward the coach, who is ambling to the pit.
“Everything okay over there, ladies?” the coach calls out.
“Everything’s fine!” I call back.
Hana bows her head, then raises it to give a small smile to the coach.
He heads back to his chair, reassured by Hana’s good manners. “Keep it that way,” he hollers.
When the three of us have climbed out of the pit, Hana brings her backpack from where she left it at the side of the room. She unzips the pack and shows us the thermos inside. “It’s boricha. Barley tea in English. I brought it with me from Korea. You two must try it. Right away. Boricha helps when you feel nervous.”
“I’m not nervous.” I want Genevieve to know I’m not afraid of her—that I’m not afraid of anything.
Hana says we must go straightaway to the cafeteria for cups. She invites Anastasia to come along too.
I walk with Hana, who is still babbling about boricha tea. Anastasia and Genevieve are up ahead, walking close together. Something Genevieve says makes Anastasia giggle.
Then Anastasia turns around to look at me. “You two were fighting over Leo?” Her eyes are laughing.
“Not just Leo,” I mutter.
“Well, there’s no use fighting over him,” Anastasia says. “Everyone knows he and Guillaume are a couple. They’ve been going out since last summer.”
“Really?” I say.
Genevieve puts her hands on her hips. “Are you joking?” she asks.
Anastasia gives us each a look that seems to say we will never—ever—be as sophisticated as a member of the Bershov family. “Would I joke about something like that?”
I can’t believe I didn’t figure out that Leo and Guillaume are together. And that I was convinced Leo liked me. The only thing that cheers me up is Genevieve not having figured it out either.
The four of us have to walk a long corridor before we reach the staircase that will take us down to the cafeteria. Along the way, we walk by the windows that look out over Second Avenue.
I notice a worker adjusting the Canadian flag hanging outside the Cirque de la Lune headquarters. “Look,” I say. “The flag. What do you think’s going on out there?”
Anastasia presses her face to the window. “Oh my god,” she whispers. “They only fly a flag at half-mast when someone dies.”
We hear the elevator doors slide open at the end of the hallway. Terence comes flying out toward us. For the first time, I notice the fine lines around his eyes.
“Why are they lowering the flag?” Anastasia asks him. “Who died?”
Terence wipes his nose. Has he been crying? “We just found out there was an accident earlier this morning at Cirque Viva,” he tells us. “A climber died during practice.” He pauses before he adds, “It was someone I went to school with. Many years ago.” He looks down the hallway. “In this building.”
Anastasia slumps forward.
I bring my hand to my mouth.
Genevieve gasps.
Hana drops her thermos of tea. It tumbles out of her backpack and rolls down the corridor.
It isn’t until later that I realize neither Genevieve nor I bothered asking whether the climber who died did tissu or rope.